We were hoppin in June-we got back from our family vacation and it seemed like summer slammed us! I was the camp director for our ward's girls camp, so last minute preparations and shopping took some time and I was off in the woods for 4 days! Camp was a blast but I'm glad I don't have to plan another one anytime soon! Grant went on a week long scout camp to Zions and Bryce Canyon. He got some serious hiking in and did it all in record heat. Record heat for southern Utah is no joke-114 degrees-no thank you. But he absolutely loved it!!
We filled our time while he was away. The younger two kids did swimming lessons.
This was Harrison's first year and he is not a natural born swimmer to say the least. The teacher kept asking him to put his head/eyes in the water. Harry would do it for one second and then pop up with a random bit of information he needed to pass along to his teacher. Ex: "I had green poop today." "Jesus taught me how to cartwheel." His teenage teacher did his best to direct Harrison back to the lessons at hand. Harrison did get dropped off the diving board a couple of times, so that required his head to go in the water. Yay Harrison!
Brenna did great and has done the high dive a few times on her on since her lessons.
We went to Jungle Jim's while Grant was gone, knowing the itty bitty rides wouldn't be something he would cry about missing! We do love the art festival as a family, so sadly he had to miss out on that.
The instrument zoo was out again and the tuba
was a favorite experiment for both girls.
The kids love the crafts. Thank heavens there were light sabers again, because Harrison was not happy with just the jellyfish project, even though it was plenty impressive.
Good thing Grant was home for Dave's birthday-he hit the big 3-8 this year! He doesn't look a day over 30...well, his face doesn't. The bald spot in the back of his head, well, that's revealing his age. Ha!
We welcomed in the month of our independence with visitors. We saw Adam and Lizzy for a day or two and then Brandon and Malia brought Jack and Gwen through as they were on their way to Washington. We were happy to spend some time with them. We went to see a movie on the 4th
and then met up with Paige, Jason, Porter, Grandma and Shannon at the park for fireworks. We have the best fireworks in our city. We loved playing games with family and friends while we danced to the Beatles Tribute Band. It is not my favorite to sit outside and melt but I do it happily on days like that!
Being the youngest has its perks in that you get later bedtimes than the other siblings ever got at that age. Harrison goes to bed so late, but he is so sleep deprived in the summer, it is crazy town. He does not like it when we laugh at him, if he is not trying to be funny. Combine that with lack of rest and it gets scary. He was so sweet the other day and came up to me to talk. He prefaces his conversations 90% of the time with, "I need to tell you something." He said those introductory words and then looked at me and said, "I just love you so much." It was so adorable, I smiled and did a little giggle. This happy smirk resulted in a scream/tantrum saying not to laugh and me feeling horrible that I turned his declarations of love into an epic meltdown.
He has been loving summer and I love this age. Harrison and I were at the zoo before school was out and he was in heaven. He laughed at the animals, but he also had to point out some landscaping to me. He pointed to the grass and laughingly said, "that is ridiculous. That is a ridiculous hole." Smooth sod is what he looks for.
We've spent lots of time with friends...
seeing Seussical, playing inside and outside, jumping on the tramp and creating many plays. It is the summer of script writing and rehearsals for the girls.
We've gone to the pool to swim, hit up the Riverton City Rodeo where our kids made out like bandits during the cash cow. One of the kids was stepped on by the calf (one guess as to who is most likely to be injured. Yep, that girl!), we drove up to the Hill Air Force Base Museum with neighbors.
We went to the float preview, participated in the face painting and balloon shapes with Paige, Jason, Porter and Shannon.
Grace was here for a few days so we got to have her sleep over and work at the food pantry with us. Our stake had a great primary activity where the kids learned about book of Mormon stories.
The gym had been turned into Jerusalem with booths and the hallway was lined with an iron rod. The youth were there in the morning when their youth conference started. It was genius to use it for the primary as well.
Here the little people are learning about burying their weapons of war. Man do I wish that lesson translated over to our house. I will say summer is rough on the contention level here. So. much. fighting. But, it is good to see the love on other days as they listen to a book on CD together, jump on the trampoline, etc One of these days it will seem like the good outnumbers the bad. One of these days...
There was a whole lot of love going around a couple of weeks ago at Rachel and Toren's wedding. We loved being able to be a part of their special day.
We got everyone out on the dance floor, I even made the pre-teen fella give me a spin out there. He secretly loved it, I am sure.
We served lunch at Primary Children's Hospital-something we all look forward to every year. We recognized some faces from our Beauty and the Beast play and while it was sad to see them up their and know their little baby was having a hard time, we hope we gave them a little love in the form of chocolate rice krispie treats! The only pictures I got were these:
Lovely. Thank you boys-the tabs on the little man's hiney are courtesy of Grant.
Yesterday, we took the kids to the Jigglefest at Thanksgiving Point. We had recieed an email about this jello throwing party. In theory, it sounded super fun. In reality, it was...for the kids. I was kind of grossed out.
It scared Harrison. He hid behind my leg even before the jello throwing began. As they counted down, we had an eye on the baby pools full of gelatin, and he just knew it was going to get ugly.
So, he stayed right by my side. I got some great video of the kids running over and really it was a ton of jigglers flying through the air, stickiness jiggling all over. People were crazy. I had anticipated doing it with the kids. But, I totally started dry heaving even just picking up jello chunks out of the grass for Harry to toss. The kids, of course, couldn't let Dave go unscathed.
They were completely covered. Brenna is holding her mouth open because it and her eyes felt like they were stuck from the jello. After the food fight, the sprinklers turned on and everyone washed off.
It was a pretty fun event, from afar! I was laughing...and then gagging.
We are pushing through summer like champs. We are loving the late nights, movies, playtime and relaxing schedule.
I am trying to enjoy it all and not wait for 'tomorrows.' I don't want to plan for things to be more fun or to be better when such and such happens. I want to make today great. This is a lesson I learned from the little guy when I told him I needed to start choosing healthy foods...then, I said, tomorrow. Who wanted to start today?! Ha! Harrison replied, ever so wisely with, "Mom, it is tomorrow." It is yesterday's tomorrow,right? So, seize the day-seize the summer!
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